


Sacrifice

by demon_dream



Category: Naruto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-12
Updated: 2015-07-12
Packaged: 2018-04-08 22:23:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4323027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demon_dream/pseuds/demon_dream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Welcoming hell with open arms. Do you have the strength to hold them open, to the end?<br/>–––<br/>[Kushina being sealed with the Kyuubi, spiced with the lyrics of If I Had a Heart by a Fever Ray.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sacrifice

[This will never end 'cause I want more. More, give me more, give me more.]

 

   "We thank you for your sacrifice."

   Blue eyes looked steadily on, a silent confirmation. The wooden steps of the platform reflected dimly the light of the braziers, cool beneath her pale bare feet as she strode calmly to the stone table. The altar.

 

   [This will never end 'cause I want more. More, give me more, give me more.]

 

   The slab was cool beneath her palm as she levered herself up, firelight slipping over the undyed gown, orange caught in white. Her right hand gathered long red hair over her shoulder, and she shifted, feet laid out, and her back met the hard granite. Blood-red strands slipped from her grasp, and both palms rested by her sides. White and red pooled on the great black slab, orange sliding over everything the shadows did not touch. The dark sky glittered with cold, distant stars, reflecting in her cerulean gaze. Her mind was clear, occupied by nothing more than those silver blazing points, and the distant warmth of embers.

 

   [If I had a heart I could love you, If I had a voice I would sing.]

 

   Her audience was silent and few, with eyes as intense as the all-encompassing stars. The moon was nowhere to be found, as if blackened and burned to nothing. Above her, at the head of the altar, the old woman with faded red hair looked down, dark purple eyes still, and maybe the slightest bit sad as they looked at one another, both resigned and accepting what would happen between them on that granite table on the night of the new moon, when the demon was at it's weakest. The kanji tags hanging from either side of the woman's headdress wavered in the girl's peripheral vision, and their gazes remained locked, as worn feminine hands closed over slender shoulders, separated by a thin layer of cloth.

 

   [After the night when I wake up, I'll see what tomorrow brings.]

 

   It happened in flashes. Or at least, that's what her mind would later recollect, after waking from bearing the weight of a creature that could knock over mountains with its sneeze. A light. Red beyond red. Evil made real, hatred and fury drawn out and condensed like wool through a carding comb and twisted into a rope of barely contained essence of apocalypse. The seal glowed on the old woman's body like a brand of the devil, before the light burst forth as though the dam had cracked, surging and spiraling, hurling itself out in a maddened rush of primal freedom. It bucked and writhed. But the girl's own chakra had come to meet it, and there was only one route the demon's chakra could flow.

    **Foolish girl.**

   Slamming the power down on fragile human flesh in the hopes of crushing the pathetic bundle of squishy guts and porcelain bones that dared tame a beast that could swallow the sun. Evil beyond evil. Hatred beyond hatred. Pain beyond pain. Nowhere near over. **Welcoming hell with open arms. Do you have the strength to hold them open? To the end?**

   To the end?

   Slitted red eyes smiled, row after row of fangs grinning. **As you like, little girl.**

   Pain. A pale hand scrabbling at black stone, bloody streaks trailing frantic fingers as they seized, flesh of her heels grating away on the uneven surface. Blood. Everywhere, blood, hallucinated, real, flooding, consuming, drowning, claiming in a sticky relentless flood of nauseous warmth. Her back bowed, straining furiously. Higher, higher, an impossible shape before snapping jarringly back to the cold stone. Tendons groaned as muscles twisted and whipped, so quickly her body remained still even as her skin seemed to boil. The world was red. The stars were gone. Those purple eyes, were they gone?

    **Ah, abandonment. Abandon. Sweet abandon, little girl. Thirst. Hunger, and it can be sated. Give, and this pain can be taken.**

   Tearing herself apart.

   Being torn apart.

    **By whom? Ah, ask. Bare those fangs.**

 

   [If I had a voice I would sing.]

 

   Still. Deep blue eyes framed in gold, red trailing from calloused fingertips.

    _I've come to save you again._

   The world is a maelstrom of swirling red, boiling and clawing, surging and seizing. Muscles still wrenching, bones still bending. Skin still bubbling. But it's background noise. _Just hold on._ Those blue eyes are calling. _Be strong, and carry on. Come home._ There's no such thing as slitted red eyes. Just deep calming blue that washes over her taut mind like the sigh of ocean wind, like home. Even as she screams. Even as she roars. Blue and gold and wind, the promise of home. _You can scream, you can cry. It's okay. We're going home._

   But it's not okay! You agree with them, don't you?

    _The only reason I'm not stopping them is because you're strong enough._

    **Kushina...!**

    _Kushina._

 

   [Dangling feet from window frame, Will I ever ever reach the floor?]

 

   It's ironic how happy she was on that caravan. Sure, there was a freaking boatload of Uzu guards. And sure, she was moving away from the ocean to some weird forest that probably had a bunch of weird people. But it's hard to feel nervous surrounded by family (in uniform or not) with the wind buffeting her long red hair towards a sky the exact same color as her eyes, with little puffy clouds playing tag across the giant space. The wheels creak, and the wood pressing into her hands and torso is warm with sunlight as she leans out, feet kicking to keep her balance before strong hands haul her back from face-planting doom.

   Sooo boring. The man with the hands is annoying. He's from the forest, and acts like he's got a freaking tree up his arse. It's all new! She swears the grass even smells different here. How can she not want to run around, climb one of those trees, roll around in a dust bath? Heck, the dust was probably nice and warm too from all the sunlight, like the beach back home. She could make do. Although it wouldn't be quite right without salt on the wind, but.... you win some, you lose some.

   Of course, she's definitely lost something. Weeks later, after she's been told why, pale feet are dangling as her butt presses the second story window frame, wood grain catching on the fabric. The air is cold through her toes, her hair. Her heart..... is falling. So they take her to see the old woman with purple eyes.

 

   [More, give me more, give me more.]

 

    **Counter me with love, girl? Interesting idea. But how long can you keep it up? Or can you at all, with the undiluted, nauseous black pain and smoldering red fury of a demon pressing down on your eyes like the headache of God? After all, someone has to deal with it. So why not the little outsider girl? Gullible enough to volunteer, expendable. So go ahead and cling to your precious love, little girl, if you can find a place to draw it from, because it's all you have left. Even if it's just a delusion.**

**Why you, anyway? It's embarrassing, to think they're trying to bind a force of nature of about the same size and power as a hurricane to your little glass bird bones. It's against the laws of.... well, everything. Physics. Isn't this child abuse?**

**Not if you mean nothing. But you mean something, right? Just not to them. Why else would you be screaming and wailing on this stone altar with no one to help you, and everyone hoping it will go on. But do you? It's your body. You don't want me here. It's not all rainbows and daisies for me either. Since we're both unhappy, why not try to be happy instead? We can do that, you know. But I'd need your help. You wouldn't be in pain, you'd have lifelong privacy and relative happiness, compared to having a demon in your guts. Win win situation, ne? Just say the word.**

**Say the word, and your pain will go away.**

**This pain. You don't want it, deserve it. You hate it. Hate being used like this. It's abuse. Unfair. So show them. You're a strong, independent kunoichi who doesn't need these fools. Stop them. Get rid of it all. Hate them. That righteous fury, use it. Break it all. They are fools for wasting you like this, fooling you like this, torturing, killing you. Hate them, hate them! Abandon this silly village, leave, they don't want you anyway, just a pretty package. Go home. Abandon yourself, wallow in your hatred, seek vengeance on those who betray you! Kill. Kill them for wasting you. Use your power for yourself. Put them in their place, at your feet. Kill them all. They are nothing.**

**You are strong. Let me help you save yourself, and you will never need saving again.**

**Even the strong need help in a fight that's bigger than themselves. Little girl.... shall we show them your strength?**

 

   [Crushed and filled with all I found, Underneath and inside, just to come around.]

 

   She is strong. It feels like the demon in all it's ginormousness is flopped over on her chest, stopping up her lungs. Her veins burn. No, those are her chakra paths, aren't they? It's no use seeing anything beyond the red haze. Rage? Pain? Blood? Hard to tell. Is it even her own? Deep breaths she can't even register shudder through her, but she feels like she's being strangled by a hot wire.

    _You are strong._

    **You are strong.**

   Her insides are her outsides, dangling wet, bare and vulnerable as she's stuffed full of coals and roasted alive. Sizzling and smoking, hissing and popping. Burned alive by her own kin. She's furious. The Red Hot Habanero strikes again, as red hair flails and flows in an echo of nine tails. But the old woman holds firm to her shoulders, that for some reason she can't feel anymore. Bleeding and in pain, but holding firm. Whether holding the girl down, or holding herself up, it's hard to tell.

    _Save yourself._

    **Hate them.**

    _Save yourself._

    **Kill them.**

  _I won't help you._

    **Slaughter.**

    _Because you can-_

    **Murder!**

    _-save yourself,_

    _ **Kushina!**_

 

   [More, give me more, give me more.]

 

   Something clicks. Breaking, sealing, it doesn't matter as she sucks cool, sweet air that tastes like green and burned wood. And blood, but who cares! Sweet mother, she can breathe! Greedily she basks in the miracle, taking another deep breath in celebration. She's a bit dizzy. Blood loss, hyperventilation? Meh. Who cares? Who cares.

   Speaking of, who does care? Hello? Bleeding over here.

   Ah!

   Shock, pain, whatever. But watching her fingernails grow back is plain disturbing. Her hand falls limply back.

   She wants to run. She wants to find this love, hold it down, and name it, so it can never get away, because something like that is too good to not be chased down and claimed on the spot. She feels like she took another sip from papa's special container she snuck from his pack on the journey, because he never let her touch it, so she HAD to drink from it, right? Man, was that fun, ya know? Cloud nine! Nine....

   Nine?

   Oh, right. She just kicked demon butt. Well then... time to party, right? 'Cause seriously, it just proves what an amazing amount of awesome she has, to have a demon locked up in her, all politics and superstition aside. Yeah!

   Grinning like a maniac, she snaps to the present and tries to sit up.

   And can't move an inch from the deathgrip on her shoulders pinning her down, as her eyes lock on glassy purple orbs that are dry, cold, and won't see anything ever again.

 

   [If I had a voice I would sing.]

**Author's Note:**

> Any musings in normal text are Kushina's.  
> Bold is Kurama.  
> Italics are Minato. He's not psychic, it's just things he's told her or things Kushina thinks he might say. A bit like how you can hear your mother's voice scolding you if you forget to lock the door.  
> And when it's bold AND italics... hm. I wonder what that could mean...


End file.
